The Indiependent’s Favourite Books

Wuthering Heights // Emily Bronte

Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights is a classic for a reason. Although the plot is confusing without a copy of the family tree and a thorough initial read-through, anyone who has read it will note that it is not solely a tale of Catherine and Heathcliff’s forbidden love. This two-volume epic is ultimately a narrative on society with traits of a ghost story, documenting the natural rebellion from oppressive ideals and the destruction of the lives trapped within this constraint.

The novel begins with Catherine Earnshaw and her brother Hindley, growing up alongside the adopted Heathcliff, a strange and sadistic boy their father mysteriously brought back from Liverpool. Following a wild childhood with Heathcliff, social expectations catch up with Catherine as she chooses to marry Edgar Linton from Thrushcross Grange even though she confesses her still-deep love for Heathcliff. When Catherine dies following the birth of her daughter, history begins to repeat itself with a similar love triangle between the younger Cathy, Heathcliff’s son, Linton, and Hindley’s son, Hareton. The beauty of this repetition is the evident attributes the characters inherit; Catherine, the daughter of the emotionally extreme Cathy and the reserved and romantic Edgar, is written as holding a balance of passion and delicacy perfectly.

This novel is truly passionate, with Bronte’s description of Catherine’s love for Heathcliff being one of the most emotional extracts in literature. These words, including the famous “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same,” paired with the setting of the wild Yorkshire moors, create the book’s enticing rawness. The novel is brilliantly well-written, with the Gothic darkness surrounding the tale twisting the emotion into something sinister. Although Wuthering Heights may be a generic choice, its legacy is completely honest. Wuthering Heights is my favourite book.

Words by Caitlin O’Connor

Next